Driving in the direction of the sun when it is near the horizon results in what is generally termed solar glare. Solar glare partially or totally blinds the driver as the driver's eyes attempt to compensate for the increased light intensity directed directly at the driver. The result is generally a markedly decreased road speed or worse, accidents that occur when the driver fails to become aware of objects in the automobile's path.
To reduce solar glare, automobiles have for many years come equipped with opaque visors that the driver rotates into the line of sight between the driver's eyes and the sun. These visors are typically on a two axis hinge that allows the visor to rotate about a vertical and a horizontal axis. By rotating the visor about the horizontal axis, the driver can block more or less sunlight coming through the windshield of the automobile. As the visor is rotated at a greater angle, more of the windshield is obscured and the driver is left with a smaller portion of the windshield to view through.
A variation of such a visor includes a transparent visor that includes multiple colored filters that are placed over the transparent visor. These filters typically are made from a semitransparent plastic material that filters out some portion of the light. By adding additional filters or darker filters, the driver can reduce the amount of sunlight without reducing the viewing window. Such visor filters have fixed increments of opacity and must be adjusted by hand, which is problematic when the position and intensity of the sunlight varies as the sun traces its path through the sky.
The present invention addresses these requirements.